There are seven key Social Informatics ideas. One of these concepts describes how ICTs are configurable. This is true because of the way they are set up. There are many individual modules within each ICT that come together in order to produce the larger and more complete technological system. They ICT can act as a system because of its many complex elements that make it up. When a socio-technical network implements and makes full use of these ICTs that are fully customizable, they become more productive. Since the ICT can be manipulated in order to work with each individual networks needs, they are optimized to be the most efficient for the network. This will cause each network to have different ICTs that are each tailored to fit their unique and specific needs. Since ICTs are not a one size fits all tool, they work so much better when used for the exact needs of the users. Rather than the developers personalizing the ICTs for every network’s special needs, the networks themselves can do the customizing in order to have a much more efficient development process. This means that the developer can spend less time on meeting specific requirements, and more time making the product more general, yet allow for an interface that permits expansion and customization.
One such real life example that allows for this personalized customization is Firefox. Developed by the Mozilla Foundation, Firefox is an open source browser used on multiple platforms. Before even customizing the application itself, the many operating systems on which it can be run allows for a larger user base and gives the users more options on where to run the program. For the applications customization, Firefox gives the user the source code so they can change the program how ever they want and compile it themselves. If the user is not experienced enough to do so, they can also download and install add-ons in the form of browser plug-in and extensions through an easy to use, user friendly interface. These add-ons give the user an extremely large array of options. The users can customize the browser to do anything from checking the weather to automatically checking email to blocking website advertisements. Even the user interface is fully customizable through the use of Themes. Almost every aspect of the application is modifiable with easy to use add-ons. When millions of users download the program, they start with a blank slate. They then begin to change and modify different aspects that they find useful. They can go back and change any of the tweaks they made at any time.
There are many people that would benefit from social informatics research. In addition to some of those mentioned by Kling, Rosenbaum, and Sawyer in the book Understanding and Communicating Social Informatics, one other group that can profit is managers. Business managers often deal with ICTs because of the complex networks in which the employees that they oversee must work in. The employees will usually deal with ICTs in inefficient ways. It is the job of the managers to direct the workers in ways that will boos productivity. In order for this to happen, a manager would need to have a firm grasp on how the technologies are being used. By doing this, the managers could better fix the right ICT for the right job. A goal of SI is to help reduce the gap between what an ICT is used for and what it was designed for. If managers were able to see and analyze how technology was being used, they could easily spot the wasteful resources and therefore be able to fix them. Just as ICT Professionals are able to use SI to modify the ICTs to fit the users’ needs, the business managers would be able to choose the ICTs to fit the employees’ needs.
Post a Comment